Chromatis – Dispersion Measurement

for full specifications or with questions

Chromatis™ production-grade test instrument is designed specifically to measure group delay dispersion in optical components for femtosecond applications. It is a broadband optical test instrument that quickly and accurately characterizes the full dispersive properties of optical components and coatings. Carefully managing optical dispersion is critical for optimal performance of ultrafast laser systems, multi-layer mirrors, and multiple quantum well structures. Chromatis is user friendly, self-calibrating, and highly accurate.

Laptop computer included, with pre-installed measurement and control software

On-site installation and training visit available as upgrade option.

Customized measurement configurations available

The example below shows where a coating company wanted to make a coating with a fixed amount of GDD over a wavelength range around 1030nm. The KMLabs Chromatis was invaluable in the optimization of GDD for this coating design.

Featured Applications:

Advances in thin film coating has been critical in the further development of ultra-fast laser science. The very high damage threshold of thin-film coated dielectric optics has allowed the manipulation and transport of high energy and high power, ultra-intense laser pulses. In order to maintain the short pulse durations, the phase introduced by the multi-layer stacks needs to be carefully designed and then carefully manufactured. Characterization of these optics is essential to ensure design specs are met.

In this work, the Authors design and fabricate broadband laser mirrors to be used on petawatt class lasers. A KM Labs Chromatis, dispersion measurement device is used to characterize the GDD of the mirrors, showing that GDD remains below 100fs^2 over the HR band, which is only a small deviation from the design parameters.

The emergence of petawatt class laser systems arround the world is motivating more research and design of the multi-layer mirrors used to steer and manipulate these extreme laser beams. These petawatt systems are intrinsically ultra-fast laser systems, so design of these optics needs to optimize both the laser damage properties of the mirrors, as well as their phase response.

In this work, the Authors design Ta2O5-HfO2/SiO2 composite quarter-wave and non-quarter-wave HfO2/SiO2 BBLD mirrors for a 30fs petawatt laser system. Laser damage of the optics are characterized by scanning electron microscope whereas the phase response (GDD) is characterized with a KM Labs CHROMATIS device. The Ta2O5-HfO2/SiO2 mirrors are found to outperform the HfO2/SiO2 mirrors.